Long-Rambling (but semi-important) A/N: So at long last I'm actually publishing a multi-chaptered fic.
Background: I wrote this last year for English class. Throughout the year we were given a list of vocab and had to use 10 out of 20 words in a chapter of a story that would be 10 chapters long - 1 chapter for each vocab list (I've added an extra elevnth chapter). This is why there are some seemingly sporadic words that aren't really consistent with the level of the rest of the vocabulary scattered throughout the story.
Beta: by Donteatacowman!
Disclaimer: Me? Own? :doubles over laughing:
I'm done now. Enjoy!
The flower-covered alpine lair and the jungle tree-house lair had both been destroyed by the Lorwardian four-legged walker-things. The tree-house hideaway was the more salvageable of the two, so together they had rebuilt one room of the complex and lived there, giving themselves a bit of time to recover from the ordeal before once again jumping into the trying business of finding yet another lair, and more henchmen, and supplies for more death rays. Of course, it wasn't a complete vacation, as they needed at least one more room, and the construction was rather arduous, especially without any henchmen who, although never especially bright, usually had enough hands between them to be useful.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, Shego knew she should take advantage of the world-wide chaos and go steal some top-secret and/or expensive items while emergency and law services were stretched so thin that their effectiveness was rather nebulous at best, but she had been feeling rather apathetic since they had won, and Drakken wasn't ranting at her, so she really had no motivation to carry out the processing of developing and acting on the thought.
She laid there, feeling as the sun came through the cracks in the wall and window to rest on her, and she rolled to face away from the offending rays and pulled the thin, ratty blanket over her face for good measure. It was nice having a dearth of responsibilities: no rants to listen to, no henchmen scurrying about, no Kim to fight, no too-big rock lair shrouded in shadows and doors that went "whoosh" until it drove you insane. Of course, she did miss her cot. She could sleep adequately on the floor, but it was definitely getting old fast.
Also, since they had only managed to rebuild one room so far, she and Drakken both slept in this room, though admittedly on opposite sides. He was probably nervous that she would blast him with her plasma. After all, she had never allowed him to so much as see her room, and had emphasized this restriction with a vituperation that included multiple threats of pain by plasma every time he got near the door. However, this wasn't her room, and it would hardly be fair to be that restrictive on him, at least until they got some more construction done.
She was glad he didn't snore. She might not have been able to restrain her plasma if that had been the case. Occasionally, when she was up later than him, she could watch him sleep, amused when his little vine would lethargically respond to what she could only suppose were dreams; waving about in small circles, growing and shrinking, and occasionally buffeting the floor with small, rhythmic taps. She wondered if Drakken would be stuck with his mutant flower powers for the rest of his life. Admittedly the petals around his head weren't growing back quite as quickly anymore, but the vine on the back of his neck refused to disappear.
Her thoughts were interrupted as she heard the sounds of the doctor in question begin to stir. She ignored his mutterings, and the thump as he stubbed his toe, keeping her head stubbornly under the blanket. She was not ready for another day of cutting and trimming trees and holding them as Dr. D nailed or lashed them together. Although the Doc had proven himself to be in decent physical condition, he still wasn't up to holding heavy logs for extended periods of time.
Slowly the smells of breakfast permeated her cocoon and she reluctantly got up, running her fingers through her messy bed-head. She groggily muttered her thanks to Dr. D as he handed her a plate of food, then went over to a wall where she could avert her eyes from the sunlight and prevent it from blinding her as it shone through the square hole that was a window. Neither of the two villains really talked this early in the morning, or, more accurately, this soon after waking up. As they were normally on the run, their daily "routines" were rather inconsistent.
Later, after she had sullenly tugged on her boots and gloves with much resentment towards the impending task, and after helping Drakken find his gloves while wondering why his vine couldn't get them, Shego found herself cutting down trees with her plasma, cutting them into board-like shapes, dragging them back to the site of the lair and up into the lower tree boughs where Dr. D was nailing them together to form a platform for the floor of the next room.
"Do we really have to do this, Dr. D?" she complained as she hauled up yet another pile of boards. "I mean, you have lairs all over the world, right? Why can't we go to one of those? I can get the hovercar working in about a day if you'd give me some time to work on it."
"Shego," chided Dr. D, launching into one of his rants, "All of the other lairs look like they've been host to multiple frat-boy parties! Did you not see what was left when Warmonga's instant-lair refolded? All of our lairs are like that. Every single one- in ruins!"
"Ugh. Well if you didn't put a self-destruct button in every lair then they wouldn't blow up then we'd have somewhere to go other than a pile of sticks..." She slapped at the air around her, "And somewhere with less mosquitoes!"
It was probably the heat, the mosquitoes, and the long nights of sleeping on wood floors that had grated upon their nerves to make them so short-tempered. Or maybe, if they had bothered to be introspective, it was the disappointment that they had saved the world from a hostile alien take-over but hadn't received so much as a thank you from temporary allies Kim Possible and Ron Stoppable, and instead had been stuck with clean-up duty while the two teens went off to graduate.
Regardless of the causes, both were particularly bellicose, and the unofficial truce that had been demonstrated by a lack of insults from either party since Warmonga and Warhok had been killed had vanished.
"Well, excuse me, Shego. I seem to recall that if some one did her job, Kim Possible and the Buffoon wouldn't have the chance to blow up the lairs!"
"Well, if you wouldn't stand there monologuing-!"
"Monologuing an important part of villain tradition, Shego! I can't-!"
"Yeah. Uh-huh, uh-huh. I'm seein' your mouth move, but nothing comprehensible is coming out of it." Her contempt for his incompetency was fairly dripping from her words, the intensity bringing back unpleasant memories of one of the rougher patches their partnership had gone through a year or two ago.
He sputtered incoherently, trying to come up with a retort and failing. "Bu- eh- na- heh- gah- Shego!"
The villainess merely smirked at him and cocked her eyebrow as if to say, "See? I'm right- again."
They continued to stare, glaring daggers at each other, both expecting Drakken to give in first like he always did. However, something interrupted their silent battle. Drakken's vine grew, extending over the top of his head, then down past his forehead to dangle just between his eyes. Both Drakken and Shego stared at the pink blossom that grew at the end of the vine as it began to wave slowly back and forth, the in circles, then tracing out lazy figure eights and other figures, their eyes moving to follow its path.
Then they caught sight of each other, hands on hips, still glaring, but standing stock-still as they followed the flower's path as if it were one of those watches used for hypnotism. It was such a bizarre and unexpected scene that small smiles made themselves known, and grew until they were chuckling as the flower still waved about as if trying to regain their attention.
"Try not to hit your thumb with the hammer. It's the only hammer we have." She offered him a friendly smirk and then leapt down to the sandy soil to retrieve more boards.
Drakken muttered good-naturedly then looked about, trying to find the hammer, unaware that his vine had grabbed it and was now holding it behind his back.